The protagonist walks into his/her home and it’s completely different- furniture, decor, all changed. It doesn’t look like the same house anymore. And nobody is home.

Today's writing. I'm stretching a bit.

The protagonist walks into his/her home and it’s completely different- furniture, decor, all changed. It doesn’t look like the same house anymore. And nobody is home.

Cara drove up to 13 Meadowlark Lane. She was so excited- she hadn’t been home to visit her family for several years, having just completed a deployment in Japan for three years. Text messages, Facebook messages, even Skype were all good ways to keep in touch but Cara felt really distant from her family home; not distant so much in miles as in connection. She grew up there and had her first date, her first prom, her first broken heart all within those walls. Of course she missed her mom and dad, and her brother Caleb, but she found that she had missed the house, too. It was part of her family and she was so very excited to return.

She was surprising everyone by coming in a day earlier than she had announced. She suspected that they would be tidying and planning and she really didn’t want a fuss. She wanted the familiarity of home as she remembered it, with Caleb’s hockey equipment piled up in the hallway or the kitchen counter filled with piles of sorted mail. She wanted to run up the stairs to her bedroom and jump onto the comfy four-poster bed and snuggle into her favorite quilt, the one with the whales and dolphins on it. She wanted to admire the walls that she had painted to resemble a sunny day at the beach with their warm blue-greens. She loved the sand-colored wooden floor and the rug that looked more like a beach towel. And she wanted to plop onto one of the tall kitchen chairs and soak in the familiarity of Mom’s country kitchen with its oak and maple decor. 

She exited from the interstate and after a few streets and traffic lights she turned onto Morninglark Lane. Her house was the fourth on the right and it sat majestically, calling her home. She parked in the driveway, switched off the engine and sat for a moment, drinking in the sight of home. Nothing had changed. It was still the beautiful blue-and-brick that she remembered, and the trees and bushes were the same, just a bit bigger. The lawn needed to be cut and some of the bushes could stand a trim, but to Cara’s eyes it was all perfect. Grabbing her purse, she jumped from the car and found herself running down the front walkway and leaping up the three stairs that led to the front door. She opened the screen door and tried the doorknob- locked. No problem, she still had her key. She fished out her old keychain and found the front door key, unlocked the door, and prepared to be awash in nostalgia.

What the heck?

She found herself in a stark white entry hall that opened up into an equally stark white living room filled with black and white furniture and dominated by a white marble fireplace. Cara stood frozen with confusion, then went back outside to check that she was in the right house. The familiar black mailbox on the wall next to the front door still displayed the number 13 in brass numbers- she was definitely in the right house. Foolishly, she realized that of course she was at the right house because her key had opened the front door. She went back inside and once again was assaulted by the unfamiliar. The entire first floor was one huge space and it was a checkerboard of black and white furnishings and decor. With a small cry of dismay, she noticed Mom’s country kitchen could no longer be called country; in fact, she wasn’t sure what to call it, other than a chrome and granite nightmare. Gone were the oak cupboards and maple table and in their place she saw glass-fronted white cabinets and a glass and steel monstrosity with spindly metal chairs. This was a nightmare. What had happened? Had her parents moved and forgotten to tell her? Then she noticed mail piles on one of the white-marbled counters- thank goodness, something she recognized. She walked over and pulled one of the piles toward her and saw her father’s name on the top envelope. This was certainly her family’s house- but where was her home?

“Mom? Dad?” she called. “It’s me, Cara- I’m home!” Instead of warm replies, she heard nothing but cold silence. “Caleb?” she shouted. No response. It seemed that no one was here. She walked around the large space, discovering more changes. A glance out the kitchen window was reassuring; the backyard appeared as she remembered it, with the patio furniture and Dad’s grilled. The old swing set was gone but after all, she and Caleb were grown now. She was a little surprised; she thought that they would keep it for the “someday” of grandchildren. Dad had built it himself out of thick timbers and ship rope and it could have lasted for another 25 years. She turned back to that terrifyingly alien kitchen and walked through it, back to the equally frozen landscape of the living room. The shock was wearing off a little but she still didn’t understand what she was seeing.

She had a horrible thought- what had they done to her bedroom? Her beautiful seaside cottage bedroom? She bounded up the stairs, noticing that the wooden railing had been replaced by a flat chrome bar that was bolted to the wall. She arrived on the second floor and found that it was all painted in the palest blue, only marginally different from the white of the downstairs. The first room she came to was her parent’s bedroom and she saw that the pale blue extended into what was once a cozy yellow haven. The old bed had been replaced by a modern affair with twisted posters of some black material. Nothing, nothing was the same in this room. The lovely wooden floors were hidden under a black rug, and in the middle of the dull gold bedspread lay an elegant but unfamiliar white cat. The cat stared at her with its green eyes and seemed to mock her; “this is my house, little girl, not yours.” She backed out of her parents’ room and turned to run down the hall to her bedroom. She stopped short as she passed Caleb’s room, or what was once Caleb’s room. Gone was the bed, the bookshelves, and his poster collection and in its place was an artist’s studio. An easel dominated the room and canvases were stacked along the walls. A huge skylight had been cut into the ceiling and the room was flooded with light. The canvas on the easel was covered with a cloth and the canvases scattered around the room contained a variety of subjects from fruit bowls to landscapes. None of the pieces appeared to be finished. This was just getting weirder and weirder.

She went on to the closed door at the end of the hallway. This was her old room and she was afraid to open the door. What more would she find? A recording studio? A junk room? Nothing would surprise her. She pulled in a deep cleansing breath and opened the door.

Oh, thank goodness. Her room was exactly as she had left it. Her beach cottage was intact with its soothing blues and greens, her beach towel rug was still on the wooden floor, and her quilt covered the bed. She crossed to the room and sat on the bed, drinking in the familiar. After a few minutes, she heard the front door open and heard footsteps. “Cara? Cara, are you home?” Her mother’s voice echoed as she walked with brisk steps through the living room and into the kitchen. Cara knew she should run down the stairs and jump into her mother’s arms, but she was still numbed by all the changes she had seen. “Cara?” “I’m up here, mom, in my room,” she said, and waited while her mother came up the stairs and down the hall.

Who was this? This tall, thin woman in a dress that looked like it was made of scarves? A woman with violent red hair? She sounded like her mother as she crossed the room with a happy cry to enfold Cara in a hug that was both familiar and alien. Mom wore jeans and sweaters. Mom wore sneakers. “Cara, honey, we weren’t expecting you until tomorrow!” this elegant woman cried. “We were hoping to have some time to prepare you…things have changed a little bit around here.” “A little bit?” snorted Cara. “Mom, everything is different. Even you are different. What is going on? Will Dad arrive in a Brooks Brothers suit?” Her dad, a high-school history teacher, always looked the part in his khakis and corduroys, and Cara couldn’t imagine what she would see when he came home after school. 

“Silly girl. Dad wouldn’t wear Brooks Brothers to teach. He saves those suits for our trips to art galleries and exhibits!” Art galleries. Exhibits. Okay, who were these people and what had become of her parents? “Mom, I am so confused,” said Cara, as her mother drew her out of the room and down into the kitchen. “Well, honey, you’ve been gone for over three years,” Mom said with a smile. “Your dad and I decided to re-invent ourselves. We took some art classes and I’ve started to paint.” She bustled around the kitchen, filling up a chrome tea kettle and pulling glass mugs out. At least this was familiar. Mom loved her afternoon tea…but Earl Grey? That was new. “With you in Japan and Caleb in graduate school, we decided to make some changes.” Changes? thought Cara. There was change and then there was upheaval. “But we didn’t want to upset you too much, so we left your room the way it was.” Cara supposed she should be grateful for this but she was still too stunned to express gratitude. “Mom, this is so different, like one-hundred-eighty degrees different. It will take me some time to adjust.” Actually, Cara didn’t think she would ever adjust. How do you go away for three years and come home to find that it wasn’t home anymore?

Her mom reached into a voluminous handbag and pulled out a stack of cards. “Cara, honey, now that you’re back in the country and living in your own place, we want to move on with your room. What do you think?” The stack of cards were paint samples. Gray, taupe, even a subdued violet. “We want to create a sitting room, a place to relax and drink in peace. Do you think these colors will create that atmosphere?” she asked as she fanned the paint colors for Cara. Cara looked up from the paint colors to meet her mother’s eyes- had she gotten contacts? They seemed bluer than usual. “Mom, you can’t change my room. Its my room! I painted it and decorated it! It’s the only sane room left in this crazy house!” she cried, as tears started to fall. She expected her mother to comfort her and promise to keep her bedroom as it was, and so she was surprised when her mother calmly said, “Cara dear, we’ve moved on. You need to accept that and perhaps move on yourself. Dad and I have been through counseling and we’ve decided to live for ourselves now. We’ve been keeping that bedroom like a shrine for you, but you’ve had your glimpse of home and it’s time for us to make the final change.” “Final change?” asked Cara, wiping at her tears. 

“Yes,” said her mother. She looked past Cara and seemed to signal with her eyes. Cara snapped her head around but never saw the hands that grabbed her or put a dark hood over her head. She struggled until the pinch of a needle in her arm sent her into a warm blackness.

The unmarked van was driving down the street as Cara’s dad pulled into the driveway. He got out and kissed his wife and asked, “Is it done?” “Yes,” she replied. “I know you wanted to see her first but she was becoming unstable. She didn’t want to accept these changes.” She looked at him just as her contacts dissolved, revealing the all-black eyes that were as cold as they were dark. They held hands as they walked up to the house and went inside, shutting the door behind them.